


TWO TO GO

by Mehdi_Foudhala



Category: BtVS - Fandom, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV), Buffyfanfiction
Genre: Fanfiction, Gen, Ripoff, plottwist
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:00:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24472432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mehdi_Foudhala/pseuds/Mehdi_Foudhala
Summary: *The events of this fan-fiction pick up right after our superhero Buffy goes on a chase to find Willow, drugged and high on magic, having Dawn trapped with her in the magic room, in the Season 6 episode 21 “Two To Go,” roughly 25 minutes into the episode. For those of you who seem to be have a foggy memory on the episode, I highly suggest you watch it back to clearly understand the context of the events. Enjoy!
Relationships: Spuffy - Relationship, Tillow - Relationship
Kudos: 6





	TWO TO GO

Upon leaving the magic shop, I didn’t have time to breathe the cold, menacing air, for a scream of panic, a feeling of fear, a horrible sensation that someone was in danger suddenly leapt into my heart. Spike? No, I didn’t have time to think about him. My arms folded on my chest as a reflex after a twitch of memory crawled its way into my head. I prayed for it to go away.  
“Willow, please…”  
“You’ll be happier, I’ll be happier without the constant whining and whimpering.”  
My eyes popped open. My legs led the way, carrying me to the direction I knew was the right one.  
“Dawn,” I whispered inaudibly.  
I gathered speed at the thought of her being alone with Willow in God knows what filthy place to pump your intestines full of magic. As the thought made me gather speed and sharpen my instincts, I heard the echoes again.  
“Willow, stop!”  
“I don’t know why you like it here, though. If you ask anyone, I’m doing you a big favor. It’s time to go join Glory. Oh Dawn, at least let her go back home, this world made her nuts and I totally relate.”  
The name of Glory itself made me bolt forward. I spidered my way up a building and jumped from roof to roof while trying to stay as tuned into their frequency as possible.  
“So, if you just close your eyes and think real loud, I will answer your prayers, Dawnie.”  
“Keep stalling her,” I whispered, hoping Willow won’t catch the frequency.  
“Oh, looks like big sister joined the chat. Time for the great finale, Dawnie. Three, two, abracadabra!”  
I thumped on the floor after a giant leap and landed near a trash station.  
“Looks like you like your dirt,” I said. And with a muffled sound, I crossed the invisible barrier that separated the human world from the wizards and the waiting room unveiled. Some people leapt to their feet in shock when I blasted the door open.  
There was Dawn, her eyes watery, her front sweaty, and Willow, closing in on her like a giant praying mantis. She spun around and looked at me.  
I stared at the jet black eyes that were maliciously examining me.  
“Just kidding,” she smirked. “Wasn’t going to hurt her, buzzkill, doorsmash, whatever.”  
I steadied my breath and locked my eyes on her.  
“Then I think you need to get away from her, now,” I said, my hands clutched to the wall, in case she would try something of a mojo on me.  
“Uh,” she sighed and turned back to Dawn.  
“Willow,” I called, slowly edging closer to get a grasp of Dawn. “You need to back down, now.”  
“I’m just talking to her,” Willow responded, obviously unbothered by me. “You know I love my Dawnie.”  
“She…tried to turn me back,” Dawn said, looking at me from behind Willow’s shoulder, her voice shaking with fear, hesitating to say more, “She tried…to turn me back into a…key.”  
“So you’re attacking the people who love you now, in addition to chasing innocent ones? Is that the new deal?” I said, not stopping until I had reached Dawn.  
“Don’t be like this, I only attack the ones in my way,” she said, tauntingly. I could see her hands drumming and her head wiggling.  
“Willow, you’re unstable. Look at you, look at the way you’re acting.”  
When Dawn was finally in my reach, I grasped her and pulled her away from her. She instantly spun around and nudged at the door, which mended itself and sealed shut.  
“Stay; we’re having a conversation,” She smiled. “Didn’t you know it was rude to waltz out in the middle of a talk, or waltz in, for that matter,” she added, eying me, mockingly. “Say, where did you learn that telepathy thing? Is there another dealer I have to drain dead?”  
“Willow, please listen to me,” I told her through clenched teeth, silently grateful she was not doing the telepathy on purpose -I could use it to my advantage- trying to suppress an urge to gasp and gag, for the woman who was standing in front of me was terrifying me, not because of the incredible power she had, which undoubtedly surpassed mine, but because of how unrecognizable she was. She physically looked like Willow, but it was as though she came from another dimension, a hell dimension. “You need help, right now. Please come with me and let’s all take care of this, reasonably.”  
“Well, sure,” she said, enthusiastic, although her voice was distorted and drowsy. “Let’s go find the two virgins and take care of them.”  
“Willow, please, take me seriously,” I said. “The powers inside of you are exponentially growing." Behind me, I could feel Dawn’s shivers rippling in my whole body as she clutched my forearm. “If you don’t stop this now, if you don’t come back to reason, there will be no coming back anymore.”  
“Oh, Buffy,” she said, fainting nostalgia. “I told you there is no coming back anymore for me.”  
“I can help you,” I told her affectionately. “I can save you from this.”  
“You?” She said, contemptuously. “Please Buffy, the irony is making my head spin. How are your meds, today? Feeling depressed? Feeling like screwing a vampire, or crawling back into that grave of yours where you felt so comfy?”  
I listened to her words with a great deal of pain, repressing tears from streaming down. I was not going to break down in front of her, she needed me. Whatever she says, I can handle it, for she was fuelled by grief and misery.  
“Willow,” I muttered to her, my voice struggling to remain still. “I love you so much, and you have no idea how painful it is for me, for all of us,” I added after Dawn’s shiver made me vibrate once more, “to see you this way. I wish I could find the right words to comfort you and tell you there were another way around it, but I can’t. What I can do, however, is be with you in this crisis.”  
“What’s the point,” She retorted, bored. And the world started to feel dizzy. “You were favored by the Gods and you were brought back because you’re the Slayer,” She finished, almost spitting her last word. “Tara was just a witch, a monster. They took her away from me, all of them.” Her voice was getting more distorted by rage, her face was twitching and bits of her hair were standing on edge. The veins in her face pulsated with what looked like black blood.  
“So, Buffy, you really are the last person to help. If anything, I should kill you, too.”  
“Willow, what happened to you? Who are you?”  
She chuckled, the world still spinning around us, my eyes hypnotized to her far-away look.  
“You don’t get it, do you?” She asked, disappointed.  
“Buffy,” Dawn whispered in my ear, but I couldn’t unlock my gaze from Willow. If she did something reckless because I dropped my guards, I could never forgive myself.  
“Buffy,” Dawn kept whispering, emphatically.  
“Everything was perfect,” Willow said. “Everything was back to normal. Then, she was taken away from me. So who am I? I am justice. I am honesty. Honest for daring to look at the world the way it really is, honest unlike you,” she nodded at me. “The giant hypocrite who thinks people can’t see right through her; the noble woman who still is under the illusion that she’s a superhero. You’re damaged Buffy, you’re unhinged, and I am to blame for that. So how about I take care of you right after I’m done with…Ahh, Jonathan, Andrew!” She turned to the left, a blissful expression on her face.  
“What?” I gasped, blinking and shaking my head. I didn’t understand, who is she calling? We were in that wizard’s room not a second ago. My head was achy and I felt nauseous. I felt Dawn’s grip loosen as she fainted in front of me. The decor swirled like a merry-go-round and changed into books, potions, stones, curtains, a giant round table and the familiar face of Xander. She teleported us to the magic shop, she had me hooked all this time, and Dawn was trying to warn me. I fell to the ground, the little emotions left not enough to motivate me back up.  
“Buffy!” I heard a distant echo from Xander. “Willow… WHAT THE HELL!”  
Then I heard a crack, and an explosion of light.

***

I was panting relentlessly, trying to catch my breath and trying to do math calculus to catch my lucidity. Willow plus magic equals evil. Willow plus magic equals rage and rampage. I healed fast and my eyes found their way back in the light. Jonathan and Andrew were still alive by some miracle, although an earthquake seemed to have hit the shop, for debris of wood, mists of dust and piles of books were scattered all around the floor. How long was I off, for god’s sake?  
“Okay, next time you deflect my spells, I’m going to have to kill your mothers, too,” She said with a casual voice. “Where are you getting this mojo from?” She scanned the room, looking for the source. Anya. She had found a way around Willow’s black magic. I can’t let her corner her.  
“Willow!” I yelled, leaping to my feet. “Back off before someone gets hurt.”  
“Can’t,” She said indifferently, still scanning the room. “It’s my favorite moment. Keep napping like Dawnie, you were better when you were dead.”  
Jonathan and Andrew shimmered and narrowed closer to the door, swords in each of their free hand, their looks as terrified as ever.  
“Oh no,” Willow said with a vicious smile, slamming the door shut. “You’re not going anywhere.”  
She focused on them and mumbled some unintelligible spell. Xander was trying to raise Dawn.  
“Buffy…” He whispered and I turned to him, both of us bearing horrified looks, both of us at a loss for words, our eyes shuffling between Dawn and Willow. I have to find a way to stop her, now. I must.  
The conversation was over.  
“Ah!” Willow said, exalted. “Now that I’m recharged, I’m pretty sure I can bash your little faces to death, not that it needs great efforts, look at how tiny they are, and I bet your brain is even tinier.”  
I marched forwards and stopped between Willow and Jonathan and Andrew, shielding them, or her…I didn’t know anymore, or cared.  
“I don’t want to hurt you,” I said, calmly.  
“Oh, that’s sweet,” She replied, softly. Next thing I knew, I was tossed in the air by the force of a truck and thrown down like a splashed wave on a pile of ashes and books, breaking the stairs in my fall.  
“BUFFY, NO!” Dawn bellowed, paralyzed with terror, her eyes wide, her tears now a fountain; Xander took her by the arms and shielded her.  
“Back to my favorite virgins,” she said, turning back to Jonathan and Andrew, as though she had just squashed a flea from her shirt.  
I got back to my feet, blood throbbing in my face and fists.  
“Get her out,” I told Xander, nodding briefly at Dawn.  
“Buffy, NO! Stop!” Dawn shrilled.  
“Everybody, get out!” I screamed. “Out! Out, now!”  
“No one’s leaving, honey, I don’t know whether you’ve been listening but,” but her clause was never finished, for at that moment, I had strode to the exact same spot where I had been ejected, pulled Willow by the hair and hissed at her through clenched teeth, “Oh, you and I are definitely not leaving.”  
A body was thrown into the air after my punch exploded in Willow’s jaw.  
She fell a few feet away with a huge boom. The shop trembled as she smashed into cracked walls and spiraled down like a noodle.  
“OUT!” I shrieked at everyone. “GET OUT, ALL OF YOU! OUT!”  
They immediately obeyed and hurried out, Xander behind Dawn, Andrew and Jonathan, trying to avoid any area of the shop that might collapse.  
“NO!” Willow yelled, and she yanked her arm towards them. A huge pull of gravity was charging at them when I pulled her back by the scruff, hurling her at the glass-cash register, face front. She smashed into it, bits of glass pelting everywhere and cutting parts of my sleeve. I shoved her so deep into the register it looked like I was trying to drown her.  
“You can take that, can’t you, Justice League?” I asked, and edge of insanity making my voice higher than usual.  
But her free arm wiggled out and punched me in the stomach; I was thrown out. It didn’t matter, everyone was out of harm’s way.  
The walls kept trembling and bits of concrete were falling from every direction.  
Willow exhaled and turned to face me, her face contorted with malice and hatred.  
“So,” she said, “Where are the scores? I need to know who’ll win this round.”  
“Let me present you your opponent, then,” I said, clenching my fists and raising my head, ready to attack.  
“The Witch Versus the Slayer,” Willow said, amused, starting to slouch around.  
“If I have to die in here with you,” I said, instantly imitating her movement, “Then the last thing you’ll see me doing is make sure you go without blood on your hands, and without you decimating the people I love.”  
“Oh no, no, Buffy” Willow said, shaking her head with excitement. “There’s going to be a lot of blood splattered across the floor.”  
“Show me what you got, then.”  
And our two bodies collided with the might of two giant hammers.

***

Slayer and Witch fought to what looked like a 2D Action-game played by a geeky nerd of the likes of Jonathan or Andrew. She kicked and viciously punched while I took most of her hits, muffled them and hit back in order to control her. Every time she tried to escape, with an unthreatened walk to the door, on the occasions she would slam me to the ground, I would trip her and grab her by the ankles, spinning and throwing her to the other side of the room, where the door was as far away as possible. This time, she hit a mirror and shattered it. I stood back up, my lips swollen, my hair disheveled and my clothes dirty. I firmly caught my speed and, not waiting for a chance for her to retaliate, dashed forwards and plunged on her. She levitated above me, made a quick loop and kicked me in the head.  
“Now, can I go Super-bitch?” She said, looking at my twitching body.  
“Over my dead body,” I growled, and I picked a piece of glass that was standing on the floor and planted it in her ankle.  
She moaned with pain and I tripped her again, this time, I tore one of the baluster stakes of the stairs and dived on her, thumping her to the ground, the stake hovering just above her heart, a look of utter madness stirring in my eyes, the look of a predator about to kill its prey.  
“Well, well,” She said, laughingly. “You really are taking your slayer gig a little too seriously. Maybe your brain got mushed in all the concussions. Me, human, me, no vampire,” she finished her last words as though she was speaking English to an ignorant.  
The stake trembled on her chest as my hands were shaking with a rage mixed with despair. I didn’t know what to do, now. My best friend was standing right beneath me, a stake pointed at her heart, her eyes black, and her veins throbbing with petrol instead of blood.  
My brief moment of paralysis was cut short by Willow knocking me out of her and throwing me by a shelf which smashed all of its contents on me, revealing Anya mumbling the spell to subdue Willow’s powers to a minimum, who was hiding in a shadowy corner.  
Willow had never been so ecstatic in her entire life.  
“Well, well,” She beamed. “Looks like all my questions are answered, after all.”  
She fondled her fingers and a giant axe irrupted from the debris. I sprung in the air and caught the axe before it pelted on Anya. The walls were shivering and I stared in horror at the ceiling that was almost entirely gone and replaced by a moonless, dark sky, only dotted with minuscule stars whose brightness paled in comparison to the light beam Willow was creating between her hands.  
“Anya,” I whispered to the terrified blonde girl who was stammering the spell, causing Willow to grow in power. “I want you to teleport yourself out of the shop. Go somewhere close and keep reciting the spell. You go, now.”  
“But,” Anya mumbled. “I couldn’t say the spell and you’ll be exposed.”  
“By which time, I will hopefully have contained this bomb,” I nodded at Willow, whose hair was standing like a giant mane. “Go.”  
She nodded fearfully and swirled out.  
I quickly scanned the room, looking for the weakest spot in the shop. It was in a corner right beside Willow, a corner that revealed the foundations of the constructions. Tiles, bricks and geysers of water were erupting from it. I ran for it and Willow exploded her spell on me. I very justly dodged it and rolled on the ground. I threw the axe on her but she froze it in midair.  
“That’s so kind of you,” She said. “I’m going to return your favor.”  
And the axe came at me like a bullet and hit my right sleeve. Blood suddenly oozed out and poured out on my arm.  
“Missed,” I told her, edging nearer to the door, making her follow me with her eyes, so that she won’t notice the collapsing shop below which she was now standing. “Maybe I should give you another gift.” And I hit one of the tiles with my legs and tore it out.  
“Buffy, you’re really getting pathetic. I thought you were tough. Who are you, what happened to you?” She repeated my earlier words, a note of caricature in her tone.  
“Who am I?” I tilted my head and threw the tile on her, one more time frozen in midair and ricocheting on a weak spot in the wall. “I’m the Slayer, bitch.”  
I let her finish her sentence in a deafening sound as the walls came to a huge collapse and what was left of the ceiling engulfed her. I was out and running as I watched Willow being swallowed by the leftovers of the storm that had ravaged the shop, now a big heap of wood and smoke. Anya was standing nearby, still chanting the spell.

***

“Okay,” I panted and started pacing back and forth. “Do not lose track of the spell. You have to neutralize her while I’m thinking of a solution.”  
“Well, you could---” she started but I interrupted her.  
“Do, not, speak,” I snarled. “Alright, think, Buffy.”  
I pinned my hands on my brain, for it was aching and throbbing. I kept pacing back and forth, worried dead that the temporary diversion would soon fade away. What if she teleported? What if the collapse didn’t hit her, what if she stopped it, froze it in midair?  
“Too many questions and not enough answers,” I thought out loud.  
Finally, I froze in the middle of the road.  
“Anya,” I spun around and hurried to face her. “You’re a witch---a demon,” I corrected when I saw her offended look. “Can I make a wish that you can fulfill?”  
She shook her head, her lips still chanting the spell.  
“Why not?” I demanded in frustration.  
She pointed to the spell she was reading, reminding me she couldn’t speak.  
“Give this to me,” I said in exasperation and I snatched it from her hands, instantly beginning to read the gibberish that was written.  
“Duemre, neineme, cheineme…” I said and nodded at her.  
“You can’t because she’s blocking all of my attempts,” She said, obviously relieved she could speak normal English for a moment. “Her powers are stronger than mine, somehow she’s acting like an antibiotic on my own power, which is ironic, because she’s more evil than me---“But I threw the book back at her and she grudgingly started reciting the spell again, forced to go back to her gibberish.  
“That’s it…” I whispered. “That’s the solution…” And I started pacing back and forth again.  
Anya shuffled her eyes between the spell and my parade, not fully understanding me.  
“We need an Anti-spell on Willow.”  
Anya angrily increased her voice while reciting the spell that would subdue Willow.  
“No, not that,” I said quickly and a rush of ideas came whirling in my mind. “Look: There is Anti-magic to magic the same way there is Anti-matter for matter in the universe. We have to find a book that would contain the purest form of magic, the holiest magic…it would cancel hers and neutralize it…with a bit of luck.”  
Anya shook her head after understanding and nodded at the book, urging me to take it. I sighed and snatched it back so she could speak while I chanted.  
“You can’t because you need a catalyzer,” She said, disappointed. “You need a body, a soul that would shelter the pure magic and expel it to Willow. I can’t do it because my soul already has demon blood in it, the magic would make me implode, and all humans have tainted souls.”  
This time, it was me who shook my head in incomprehension, still not daring to break my spell-chanting yet, for I had the terrible impression that the gravel was starting to shake and move from underneath the shop’s ruins.  
“The Pure magic will neutralize the Black magic,” Anya explained. “But in order for that to happen, it needs a strong enough body to handle its format. And it needs a pure soul, a soul that is not tainted by evil or by the primordial human desires. No, Buffy,” She shook her head when I was about to say “Dawn” or “Xander.” “You’re forgetting the part about the body. Have you taken a look at Xander’s cute and tiny meat sack? Humans’ bodies are too weak, they would never handle the pressure of the magic in it, it would never work, and they would die. Willow may survive because the magic in it will only destroy and annihilate the Black magic in her, but hopefully, it won’t touch her humanity. We would need…a superhuman for that to work.”  
“Vampire,” I whispered instinctively, but went back to chanting, instantly regretting my distraction. The ruins were now moving, I was absolutely sure of that.  
“No, Buffy,” Anya shook her head again, sadly. “It needs someone with a soul. The magic will never penetrate an evil being...”  
I tried to convey “Angel” via telepathy, for the ruins were shaking and the chant started to ring as gibberish and as useless as possible. Anya thankfully understood, but kept the same expression.  
“No, Angel is a vampire, soul or not. It has to have a pure human soul,” and then, for a moment, she looked at me, and instantly snatched the book from my hands and chanted again, perhaps with a better accent or just to let me breathe, but I did not breathe. I took some time to sink the amount of information that I was just given. I tried to think of someone superhuman with a human soul. Clem? Should I fetch a good demon? No, the instructions are clear: no demon.  
I involuntarily thought of Xander, Dawn, Giles, and Angel…even Spike, for a brief moment.  
“I…I don’t know anyone like that,” I stammered, shamefully. But Anya came to me and gently rested the spell book on my hands, a hopeful smile on her face.  
“You, Buffy,” She said.

***

The words reached my ears in the form of a foreign language.  
“What?” I frowned, completely neglecting the spell book.  
“You!” Anya insisted emphatically, her eyes glowing. “You are the Chosen One, Buffy! You’re the superhuman, the superhero! You are grounded in moral values and moral duties, and your body is strong enough to handle the Holy magic!”  
“No,” I said in a very clear denial.  
This time, it was Anya who looked awkward.  
“What do you mean, no?”  
“I’m not…I’m not a superhero,” I painfully shook my head, for the headache was getting stronger and stingier.  
“What are you talking about, of course you are!” Anya said, indignantly. “You’ve saved the world, a lot! Isn’t that what is written on your grave?”  
“I came back,” I said, bitterly. “And nothing was ever the same.”  
I could clearly see myself lulled and tempted by darkness, sleeping with the devil, and comforting myself with sweet asylums.  
“My soul,” I said, itching my body as though it had flea all over it. “My soul is infected.”  
“Buffy,” Anya said, desperately. “You were chosen. The quality of your soul is not measured by who you sleep with. Either that, or you will have to kill Willow before she kills us all.”  
Suddenly, an explosion of rocks and tiles made both Anya and I gasp. A dark, tall, shadowy figure emerged from the shop’s ruins and Willow was surrounded by some kind of mystical aura, which was glowing green, her feet hovering above the ground, her hands clutching the air around, trying to grasp for something to strangle.  
“Someone hasn’t been reading their homework,” She said, lazily, her head wiggling right and left again, her fingers drumming and pointing at the book of spells that I instinctively hid in my shirt. “So, who should I thank before I kill? Anya the vengeance slut, or Buffy, the Super-bitch?”  
“Alright, I’m convinced,” I said quickly, turning back to Anya. “Go get all the books necessary for it. And try to keep an eye on the others. Go. NOW!”  
She hesitantly looked at both Willow and I and disappeared with a last look of fear. I wheeled around to face the monster.  
“For God’s sake, Buffy, take a nap. You look like you came back from heaven,” She said.  
“I though you regretted bringing me back, don’t you?” I asked, slowly walking towards her trying to improvise a diversion, the perfect line separating us shrinking.  
“I do,” She smiled. “How about I dig your grave again, what do you say?”  
“Sorry,” I smiled. “Slayer duties again. Only way for me to die would be to live.”  
“Agree to disagree. I have a much more effective way of taking care of your life. It’s time you went back to the little moldering corpse you were turned into.”  
“You know, for someone who’s got more veins than they can handle, you sure like to make vain-y threats.”  
An immense green light was shot at me and I immediately swerved and rolled on the ground. I grabbed the first object my hands bumped into –The axe of earlier- and pelted it towards her.  
“Return!” She shouted, and, like a boomerang, the axe ricocheted back to me. I firmly caught it in my hand and sprang to my feet.  
“Thanks for the gift,” I beamed.  
But Willow was already rising in the air, chanting weird words in Latin, her head high, her hands spread-eagled, she looked like a giant flying alien.  
“Are you praying?” I asked. “Cause if you need a little privacy, I could swing by later and we could catch up.”  
Speaking of catching, an immense root, at least two feet in diameter, irrupted from the concrete below me and strangled my leg with its tentacle. I cut it as fast as I could, for the root made me trip. All around me, dozens of giant roots slithered out of the ground, cracking the tar. They danced and wiggled in the air like gross snakes.  
“The grave wants you back, Buffy,” Willow’s voice echoed in the cool air. I spun around and saw that she was standing on a church’s roof. She rang the bell and it rippled around in distorted waves across the area. Dozens of people looked from their window, surprised and shocked there was a call to the mess this late in the night, in addition to other ones, who were startled by the collapse of the magic shop and the smoke emanating from it.  
“Willow,” I pleaded. “These are innocents. If you have a problem with me, then your only target is going to be me.”  
“My target has never been you,” her voice shouted. “You just happen to be a weed that I need to cut, you’re just an instant gratification.”  
“Do not leave your houses!” I yelled at the people, who were now opening their front doors. “Get back inside! The roots are poisoned! (Only diversion I could think of to keep them afar) DO NOT LEAVE YOUR HOUSES!”  
But to my great horror, Giant roots were slithering out of windows. I could hear screaming, yelling and crying festering and spreading.  
“Okay, on second thought, GET OUT! ALL OF YOU!”  
And I swirled like a tornado, slicing and dicing as many roots as I could. I cut parts of my pants, for the roots had thorns in them, but my outfit was the least of my problems, for the more I cut, the more they seemed to be. I panted as I surfed my way to the end of the street, swinging from sliced root to another, jumping and dodging. After what looked like a gymnastic drill, I finally cleared the passage for the people, spinning, slicing, cutting and axing, orbiting around the trees to contain them.  
“Everybody, this way!” I called at the innocents as I forged them a way out of the thorn maze.  
They all rushed and squeezed in the narrow path like small ants, the street was now littered with dead roots and trunks, still twitching like tentacles.  
“Boy, you really hate mother-nature,” Willow’s voice echoed again, but I didn’t pay attention. All I wanted was for the innocent men, women and children to be out of here. “Doesn’t surprise me, look how fake you and artificial you are.”  
“Go to your aunts and grandparents!” I yelled at them. “Just avoid the forest and don’t take your cars.” As I finished my sentence, I spun around to the church. “And don’t forget you have a limited juice Willow, whereas I can still stand a long way from here.”  
She cast a huge red light on me and I remembered I still had the book of spells with me. Instantly, I pulled it out and recited the formulas. The beam of red light stopped in the air at once, like a frozen lightening, a picture of a sunlight.  
I could hear Willow’s echoes shriek with pain.  
“But that’s not because I’m the Slayer,” I continued. “I can stand a long way because I have something you will never have again.” I marched forward, the light beam exploded like a firework.  
“Something so beyond your evil comprehension,” I repeated the spell enough out loud to be able to perform it in my mind, and it seemed to work, Willow was twitching with pain and fury. I climbed on top of a roof and kept ascending.  
“Something you can’t conceive of, my dear best friend,” I said. Finally, when I reached the top of the church, I ceremoniously punched her in the jaw and she fell on the floor.  
“That something is hope,” I ended. To add a little bit of pain, I screamed the formula out loud, releasing all of my anger, all of my resentment, and all of my incomprehension.  
Her body was throbbing. The church was vibrating under the spasms she was sending as her powers diminished. I grabbed her by the scruff once again and pinned her to a pillar on top of which a gargoyle was perched.  
“Don’t you ever threaten the lives of thousands of innocent people,” I snarled, my voice so cold and icy it made the air around us feel warmer. “As of now, I do not give a crap who was killed, I do not give a single ounce of damn about you losing your lover. You touch one hair of innocent man, woman, or child, and I swear upon all that is dear to my heart, I will give you a fate even worse than Tara. You hear me?” I slammed her to the pillar after every syllable I pronounced, “DO, YOU, HEAR, ME?”  
“This spell,” She hissed, blood pouring out of her mouth and staining her outfit. “Won’t hold… me…forever.”  
“Oh I know it won’t,” I told her reassuringly. “I am perfectly aware that, any moment now, you’re going to be at full strength again. But I stand by my words. If I am to die with you, the last thing I will do is make sure you go without killing anyone else.”  
“Did you count yourself or are you too modest for it? Always caring about other people,” She said, spitting blood on the ground. “The truth is, Buffy, you only care about your sorry self, and you keep saving those people, hoping it might tip the scales for your dirty body.”  
She spat another pool of blood as I slapped her.  
“Shut the hell up,” I commanded.  
But as she laughed hysterically, an earthquake rose from the ground.  
“What did you do, now?” I rolled my eyes. “Caused a mother-nature apocalypse? Made spores that turn everyone into a lesbian?”  
“Oh, I’m sorry,” She whispered, as though she was being scolded. “The earth still wants you back.”  
I sighed and closed my eyes as I heard distant rattling noises and moaning voices. The sounds were getting closer and the footsteps were slow and sluggish. Eventually, I opened my eyes again and slowly pivoted…and gulped.  
Well, if you want to see the glass half full, the street of Sunnydale was still very cute with all the trees that had grown. If you want to see it half empty, or half totally-void-of-atoms, an army of zombies was dragging their undead feet towards me. Not vampires, Zombies. Undead humans with dangling jaws and decomposed bodies. There were at least thirty of them.  
“Ever considered my question to be rhetorical?” I asked, but as I turned, a fist exploded in my face and I was flung down from the top of the church. As I fell on the nearest rooftop, I kept screaming the magical formula in my head.  
“Come on, Anya,” I whispered. “Where are you? What’s taking so long?”  
Although the idea of me sheltering the holiest form of magic was quite unsettling as I did not consider myself pure nor holy, the very few options we had left had me cynical. Willow, you’re so going to pay for this.  
I rose from the rooftop, jumped and soared on the floor. The zombies started moving faster.  
“What? You saw a hot chick and you got excited?” I asked, picking up the axe. “Gee, I wonder when the last time you touched flesh was. But then again, you…barely are flesh anymore, so I’m thinking, you got a bone-kink or something?”  
One of the zombies picked a root and tossed it in my direction.  
I dodged it and swirled back to face them.  
“Okay, not quite the reception I was expecting,” I said. “I wonder what I should do with you given you’re not exactly evil, just possessed.”  
That was true. They were humans, poor, dead humans reanimated into evil corpses, ironically, I related to them. I didn’t know if killing them was something I was comfortable with.  
“Meh,” I waved at them. “Then again, I was dead too, and I remember how peaceful it was. But I still managed to emerge pretty. So, today is the day you die again. Wonder what they’ll put in your graves. Mine has ‘Saved the world a lot’, yours will probably have, ‘died a lot’…sorry…” I chuckled, but then I received another hit, this time, it was a pillar.  
I wheeled around to make sure Willow was still on the roof, but she had disappeared.  
“I stand by my words, too,” I heard her echo. “There will be a lot of blood.”  
“Damn it, Anya,” I swore under my breath as the zombies zoomed closer and closer. This time, I was scared, not because of the gross botched Halloween freaks who were coming to go all Resident Evil on me, but because Willow was gone. By now, she could be anywhere, she could already be by Jonathan and Andrew’s throats…But Xander and Dawn were there, she wasn’t going to hurt them, right? Reassuring myself with this hypothesis after I just got my ass kicked and a horde of undead raised especially for me by Willow was not the greatest plan to cope with the current situation. I started sweating and panting again, the zombies were not stopping their dragging feet and I was framed. Anya was not back and Willow was gone. The plan had failed. The world was really ending. Willow won, Dark Willow won…No! I will not tolerate that. I swore to protect the earth, I swore to fight to my last breath even if the fight was already lost. Whatever was coming, I was ready for it. And my cute outfit just got ripped, I would not accept that. I plunged into the river of zombies.

***

Anya appeared by Halfrek’s side near a mausoleum. It was stuffed in the middle of a dense forest, twinkling with fireflies and towering, thick trees. The mausoleum was dimly lit and it displayed a stoned pathway.  
“They keep letting the grass grow, they think anything involving nature is good. I hope they don’t have the same philosophy for their body hair,” Anya hissed at Halfrek, who shook her head, grinning.  
“Come on, if you want to help your friend, we have to hurry, I can sense that witch growing stronger, and she keeps rejecting me. Not boosting my ego,” She said, flicking her hair haughtily.  
They trotted towards the mausoleum, which looked like a cottage made out of painting. In fact, the whole scenery looked like an artwork for its beauty, except for the icy, cold English draught that stung the two demons’ faces.  
“Buffy can stop Willow,” Anya said matter-of-factly.  
“Then why don’t you seem convinced?” Halfrek asked, walking carefully with her high heels to avoid tripping on a stone-slit.  
“You weren’t supposed to notice that,” Anya replied, grumpily. “And why are you all casual?” She asked after seeing her emerald dress and curled hair.  
“Well, I was on a date,” She said lightly. “I was gently talking to the gentleman, waiting for him to wish something disgusting to his wife and all of a sudden, it just got…I don’t know, distorted.”  
“I know, I’ve been practicing this spell that stops Willow from using her mojo, I must have disturbed the signal, even my own powers are temporarily screed,” She said, her face worried again when she remembered veiny Willow.  
“No, no,” Halfrek replied. “The signal was distorted before. It’s like someone hijacked the frequency and kept meddling with it.”  
“Wait…Willow did that?”  
“I don’t know,” Halfrek shrugged. “Maybe she doesn’t know she did it either. She’s not aware of the magnitude of her powers yet, so I suggest you keep your thoughts to yourself. She could be listening right now.”  
“We’re in the middle of nowhere in England!” Anya protested, almost tripping on a stone-slit.” How is she supposed to hear me?”  
“I told you, I’m not sure,” Halfrek said reproachfully. “And I don’t want to have the confirmation from her when it’s too late. I didn’t come to Sunnydale to get killed or to have my friend be killed. Let’s go finish this.”  
“Wait a minute,” Anya said, stopping at once, almost tripping again. “If the frequency’s hijacked, maybe I can tune in and speak to the others.”  
“I really do not suggest that, Anya,” Halfrek disapproved. “She could hear you and be on her way.”  
Anya shook her head. “She’s not after me, she’s after the two virgins, and possibly Buffy. She seems to hold this grudge against her. Even if she knew where we were, she has no idea what we’re planning, and she would lose her time looking for us. The mausoleum is supposed to be protected from Black magic, isn’t it?”  
“It prevents you from using black magic, but it’s not a neutral place, it’s still mystical,” Halfrek retorted.  
“I have to try,” Anya said, determined. “Dawn is with them…and Xander.”  
Halfrek tilted her head.  
“Don’t tell me you’re still in love with that mortal?” She asked.  
“He’s a stupid, immature man,” Anya mumbled. “But he doesn’t deserve to die, and neither does Dawn…Okay.”  
“Anya! If they respond to you, Willow might know their location and go after them,” Halfrek yelled. “You’re putting them in more danger than safety.”  
“Fine!” Anya yelled. “I’ll just warn them.”  
Anya closed her eyes at once and tuned in.  
“Jonathan?” She whispered. “Can you hear me? Are you alive? DO NOT ANSWER IF YOU CAN. Just, make a groan or something. Willow is still after your asses. You’re the only wizard among them. I’m sending you the formula to subdue Willow via telepathy. I hope to God you’re all still alive, please take care of Dawn and Xander if you have the least bit of compassion and humanity left in you.”  
She then fell silent at once, only her lips were moving irregularly.  
“Repeat this as much as you can, and go to Spike’s lair, you may have a shot in there.”

***

“An—“Jonathan started.  
“DO NOT ANSWER IF YOU CAN. Just, make a groan or something. Willow is still after your asses. You’re the only wizard among them. I’m sending you the formula to subdue Willow via telepathy. I hope to God you’re all still alive, please take care of Dawn and Xander if you have the least bit of compassion and humanity left in you. Dureme, neineme, cheineme. Repeat this as much as you can, and go to Buffy’s second favorite place, you may have a shot in there.”

***

“They’re alive,” Anya said, at once popping her eyes back open. “Okay, let’s go find the Holy Grail.”  
“What’s Buffy’s second favorite place?” Halfrek asked, casually.  
“Spike’s lair.”

***

Jonathan bolted up in his position, startling the three of Andrew, Xander and Dawn.  
“What now?” Xander inquired. “You got a flatulence?”  
“It’s Anya,” Jonathan whispered, looking in every direction as though terrified of being overheard.  
Xander stepped forward and grabbed Jonathan by the collar.  
“What about her?” He asked, shaking.  
“She just sent me a message---Get off of me!”  
“What kind of message? Is she in danger? Where’s Willow and Buffy?”  
“I don’t know!” Jonathan jerked Xander’s arm off of his shirt. “But she said the astral frequency was hijacked and Willow could be listening to our conversations. She sent me the formula to repeat and she told me to go to Buffy’s second favorite place. Anyone knows where that is?”  
Xander glared at Jonathan for a moment and then nodded.  
“Okay, another trip to the peroxide academy, then,” He sighed and they changed their direction. “What about Anya, where is she?”  
“Don’t know,” Jonathan shrugged. “I couldn’t talk to her, Willow would have heard me.”  
“Well then how come she was able to talk?” He asked, perplex.  
“She’s probably in a safe place. I could feel a white orb, something very pure. It was like Dark Magic was inexistent there. But she’s safe.”  
“What about Buffy?” Dawn ran to catch up with Jonathan and Xander. “Is she okay? She could talk to me via telepathy, too. Earlier when I was with Willow.”  
“I don’t think she can send you signals by herself though,” Jonathan replied. “She’s not a witch or a demon. She doesn’t have telepathy.”  
“Well, how do you explain our conversation, then?” She asked, frustrated.  
“I don’t know!” Jonathan answered in exasperation.  
“You’d better know, then,” Xander said. “Because it’s thanks to all of us that you’re still breathing.”  
“What do you mean all of you?” Jonathan said, indignantly. “You rejected me when I offered my help to translate the Babylonian text! I could have spared us a lot of time.”  
“Pardon us for not trusting villains,” Xander smiled.  
“Oh yeah? I’m the one who told Buffy to destroy the orbs of Nezzla’khan!”  
“Yeah, and it worked out well with your buddy Warren shooting a firework of bullets in our garden.”  
“That’s not fair!” Andrew suddenly interfered.  
They all turned to look at him.  
“I mean,” Andrew stuttered, more deflated. “He couldn’t have predicted that Warren was going to go all serial killer on you guys.”  
“Yeah,” Jonathan said, defensively. “And since when are you on my side?” He nudged at Andrew.  
“Since they’re our only hope of not being sliced,” Andrew hissed.  
Jonathan sighed.  
“Look, I’m sorry you guys,” He said. “But right now, we have to go to Spike and I will recite the formula out loud, I can’t risk thinking about it. She could catch my frequency,” he shivered at the reference of Willow.  
After a minute of pause where loud breathings could be heard, they all reluctantly resumed their pace.

***

Anya and Halfrek were finally at the threshold when the door burst open.  
A man, tall and handsome, with graying hair and wrinkles around his eyes, shadowed by round spectacles, faced them, a look of relief and an expression on him.  
“Giles!” Anya screamed, and she threw herself at him, embracing and hugging him so tight she almost disappeared in his tall and muscular frame.  
After long minutes of embrace, Halfrek coughed.  
“Hi,” She said, as though she had just seen him.  
“Hello,” He said politely, and released Anya. “I had so hoped you wouldn’t have to come all the way here. I thought maybe I could intervene in time.”  
“Willow’s gone homicidal, Giles,” Anya cried. “She’s gone mad! She’s breaking things and killing and flaying. Tara is dead! She’s after the one who killed her and his accomplices. She killed one and there are two more to go. They didn’t technically kill Tara, they’re not murderers, but she wouldn’t hear anything---“  
“I know,” Giles interrupted her, and she remembered to breathe. “A coven in here told me about the rise of an evil power, an evil that inhabited a human body. An evil fueled by grief and vengeance. Well, forgive me, but at first I thought it was you, Anya.”  
“You’re all forgiven,” Anya said hastily. “Giles, we have to get the Holy Magic. Buffy’s in there, trying to contain Willow but she’s too strong, she will not last forever.”  
“Yes, yes, please do come in,” He said, gulping at the mention of Buffy’s name and instantly letting them in.  
“What are you doing here, by the way?” Anya asked as the air got warmer and sweeter once they were inside.  
“The same thing as you. I had the same idea, only I was a little closer than you,” He said. “You can fill her up by yourself. She’s waiting.”  
He opened a massive, wooden door and revealed a big, circular room, dimly lit by blue flames.  
All around the walls, crosses, stars, moons and crescents were pinned. Oil paintings were hung, paintings of Greek Gods and fearsome creatures. At the center of the room, was a chair, and on the chair, sat a woman, who looked old, yet her wrinkles themselves did not seem to make her age. It was as though her history was marked upon her face and was the one that gave her this ancestral feeling, not her blindingly white, long hair, and not her shivering hands. She smiled.  
“Welcome,” She said, her voice soft like honey, yet clear like water. It did not echo, which led to believe the room was more filled than it looked like. Boxes were piled upon each other and flowers decorated the rest of the walls.  
“As you can see, I have been kept in good company,” She smiled at Giles, who blushed.  
“Uh,” Anya said, awkwardly. “Good evening…your majesty.”  
The woman chuckled. “There will be no need for that, for I am neither a queen nor a goddess. I am merely a guardian.” She turned at Giles. “Did you forget to fill them up?”  
“Well,” Giles said, embarrassed again. “We really did not have a lot of time.”  
“Of course,” She said at once, and stood up, coming to meet Anya and Halfrek.  
“I imagine you know the Holy Magic is not to be taken lightly…I am curious, however. Are you two Slayers?”  
Anya and Halfrek looked at each other.  
“What?” They both said.  
“Well, the only soul in the whole universe who can bear the burden of the Holy Magic is the Slayer, of course. You know that, right?”  
“Yes, we do!” Anya said quickly. “We came to deliver it to her.”  
The woman stared at them, a little confused.  
“The Slayer has to be imbedded with the Magic itself in this holy ground,” She explained. “You can’t haul it to her.”  
“But we can teleport her, can’t we?” Giles asked, worried.  
“Naturally,” She responded, kindly. “Though, is she ready to accept the price? I was expecting to have a little private talk with her.”  
This time, the three of Giles, Anya and Halfrek looked at each other.  
“Okay, your majesty,” Anya sighed. “Could you please meet us halfway?”  
“I see,” She said courteously and turned to admire her paintings. They suddenly started twisting and the blue lights started flickering. Shadows were dancing in the air, shaping vague forms.  
“A Slayer is the Chosen One, the only among billions chosen to fight the forces of darkness. She must not abandon her duty.” Images of a girl fighting demons zoomed in the room. It was like watching a silent movie, only your imagination could hear the fists of the girl punching and the roars of the demons.  
“The Shadow Men created the First Slayer,” The woman continued, materializing three black men in ragged robes. “They imbued her with the Magic, etched it in her DNA, as well as the generations to come. She was their weapon, for they were wizards, not fighters. However…” And the shadow men vanished, replaced by a black orb, like a big fog curling up in the air and oddly twisting, as though it was being tortured. “Their magic was not pure. The Shadow Men built their Slayer with the Demon blood, a blood stained with darkness, rooted in evil.” The orb transformed into a grotesque kind of reptile, like a T-Rex but with bigger canines, roaring silently and deploying its long, sharp claws.  
“It was foolish and pretentious of them to do that, of course,” And the monster disappeared. The room came back to normal light. “For when it came to this decisive moment, when the Slayer will have to resort to Holy Magic, her power will be destroyed, for the Holy Magic annihilates and neutralizes any form of darkness.”  
She fished a light from the candle aside her and fondled it in her fingers. It danced in the air, drawing fiery words until, after completing its task flew down and rested on its candle again. Giles, Anya and Halfrek’s curiosity was moonlit by the written sentence: You think you know, what you are, what’s to come? You haven’t even begun.  
“Of course this speech was meant for her,” She smiled, the words disappearing in a puff of smoke.  
Anya and Halfrek were speechless. Giles sunk his head to his neck.  
“I assume she’s not aware of the choice she will have to face when she meets us in here?” She asked rhetorically.  
Anya looked at Giles, expecting him to have the answer. He merely closed his eyes, painfully.  
“She asked me once, about her origins,” He said. “I couldn’t answer her. I couldn’t just throw that in her face. I knew she would never recover from it.”  
“You knew all of that?” Anya asked, appalled.  
“Please,” The woman said. “There will be no screaming in the Holy House.”  
“Sorry…you knew all of that?” She repeated in a lower voice.  
“Well, I assumed you too knew,” He replied defensively. “You’re a thousand year-old demon.”  
“I knew,” Halfrek said.  
“You did?” Anya glared at her in disbelief.  
“Well of course, Anyanka. The origin of the Slayer is very well known in the underworld. Why do you think some demons fancy her? You think Dracula got the information from reading Watchers’ manuals? No offense,” She quickly added at Giles, who flapped his hand dismissively.  
“Well, I heard rumors that the Slayer was some kind of… well, of hybrid,” She said. “I don’t know, I guess I just didn’t care much. Or maybe I thought it was wrong because…well, Buffy’s a good person. She’s a hero. I mean, have you taken a look at her? There is literally not a hint of her evil blood. The only times she would slip is when she’s confronted to human choices, but that’s only natural, not evil.”  
“She’s much more than that”, Giles added, a proud tone in his voice.  
“Of course she is,” the guardian smiled. “The purity of your soul, the goodness of your nature is not defined by your DNA. Life itself is not defined by who is predisposed to be cursed or blessed. Life is defined by what we learn and what we teach. It does not matter who was born before you, for only ignorants die the same way they were born. Are you ready to call upon her?”  
“Wait!” Giles interjected. “Is there a way for her to gain back her power?”  
The guardian thought for a moment. “She would have to take a long journey, and meet the Shadow Men all over again, using magical formulas that are long lost. I…cannot guarantee she will be the same person afterwards. I cannot even guarantee the Shadow Men will cooperative. They will think she has denied them their gift, rejected it.”  
“But there is a possibility, right?” Giles insisted.  
“A very narrow and risky one, but yes,” She answered. “That is all I can tell you, for the rest is upon the hands of the Chosen One.”  
Anya looked at Giles, a look of hesitation in her eyes.  
“Anya, please,” Giles said. “Now is not the time to back down.”  
“I’m not,” She mumbled. “But…Buffy…”  
“She’ll have her power again. We’ll figure out a way.”  
“No, I meant, when she learns about herself.”  
“We don’t have time for this, Anya. Willow could already have destroyed the west coast, is that how you want your world to end? Tell me!” He asked, hysterically.  
“No,” she sobbed. “I just…I don’t want to carry this secret. Promise me you’ll tell her, eventually.”  
Giles briefly glared at Anya and his look quickly shifted from her to land on the guardian again.  
“Please, your Majesty, we would like you to bring the slayer to us, now.”  
She grinned. “Let the fate be on your side!”  
She clapped her hands and all at once, everything turned dark.

***

It was as though I’d turned deaf. The air felt warm and heavy on my shoulders, the dryness of the climate helped the blood on my clothes drain. Yet, I was still shivering. My voice seemed to be blocked by an invisible arm, strangling it; my sight, blurred by all the blood I had sustained from the massacre that had just happened. Lying all around me, were torn legs, ripped arms, hands and faces. Faces decomposed by decay and death. A river of blood streamed down the sewer. The only times I would feel something were the times my memory reminded me of the sound my axe made when it cut open a body, sliced it in two, three or irregular shapes, just to stop them from screaming and from rattling their voices. That screeching sound. It made my ears whistle and it made my back ache. My knees buckled and I bent on the floor, the axe still drooping blood and rests of brain; it slipped out of my hands as I no longer seemed to have nervous receptors to hold it, no will to grab it. I only put my elbows on the tar of the street to avoid drenching myself in more blood, not that I needed this kind of precaution. My entire clothes were soaked crimson. I was dirty, I was filthy, and I was rusted. I raised my head to the air, my eyes closed, no tears heavy enough to succumb to the gravity and fall. I sat on the floor for a long moment, for a breeze of fresh air, sweet and welcoming, whooshed through my flanks and tickled my filthy face. I opened my mouth, inhaling as much of the pure air as I could, slowly relaxing my features. It was not unpleasant. On the contrary, it was rather refreshing and somehow intoxicating, almost poetic. The champion is presented her reward after defeating the villains. It was poetic because I felt like the villain. I had mutilated those corpses and I couldn’t bear to open my eyes, to witness the product of my own hands. Buffy the Killing machine. I had never felt less human in my entire life…Willow was right, blood was splattered. She kept her end of the bargain, and I wasn’t sure whether or not I could keep mine anymore.  
“Buffy, it’s time.”  
Oh, shut up, Giles, I thought. Of all the coping mechanisms, I had to hear my old watcher, my subconscious must be as rusted as I am.  
“Buffy, my dear, it’s time for you. Come to us. Let my voice guide you to the light.”  
Sure, Giles, I’m coming right away. That was sarcasm, in case you missed it.  
The sweet and fresh air encircled me like en embrace and it was making itself more and more present by moving leaves and blowing them in the air. I did not know where it came from, for the entire street was smelling like obsolete meat and rusted metals. I frowned slightly, my eyes still sealed; I was afraid the sweet air was only the fruit of my imagination, but, to my astonishment, it got louder and noisier. I popped my eyes open, but the street where I was standing, defeated, had suddenly vanished…I was flying. What the hell? I looked below me at the blindingly green field and the deep blue ocean that caressed its shore with its soft waves. The air was perfumed with flowery scents that was hauled by the current.  
“What?” I stuttered. “Giles? GILES?!” I shouted, for I finally realized that Giles’ voice was real and not the fruit of my lost mind.  
“Buffy!” I heard Anya speak in the background.  
“Anya! Where are you?” I asked, waving my hands frantically, trying to pilot my way down to the field.  
“Buffy!” Her voice was cheerful, this time. “Thank God, you’re still alive! We found it, Buffy! We found the Holy Magic! It’s ready for you! Jonathan and Andrew are still alive, so there’s an excellent chance Xander and Dawn are still alive too!”  
I sighed, deeply relieved, but still not strong enough to work up a smile.  
“It’s ready for you, Buffy!” Giles shouted encouragingly.  
“Well, then, just slam it on me, already!” I protested, still uncomfortable in the air.  
A white light danced its way down to me, and an old woman appeared, white in almost every inch of her body, except her skin.  
“Damn, who’s your esthetician?” I said, almost ashamed for looking so ragged and smelly. But suddenly, upon instinctively examining my outfit, all the blood and dirt was gone. I was wearing the same outfit, black V-neck and leather brown pants, my cross was shining on my neck, and my hair was clean, polished and straightened.  
“I’ve got to remember the address,” I said, groping my hair, finally cracking a chuckle, which felt odd.  
“Hello, Buffy,” The woman smiled. “I am the Guardian of the Holy Magic. I wish we had more time to discuss the consequences of your actions, but time is unfortunately a luxury we cannot afford at the moment. In here, lies the purest form of cosmic Dust. Use it only to do Good, and by God, may the fate be on your side.”  
She opened a golden box which contained a shimmering power of rainbow colors, almost like a highlighter, which blew in the air and engulfed me.  
I saw the woman disappearing and the sun rising from a distance, but it became harder to see as the aura around me was getting thicker. It was swarming and I could feel it sink in my skin, cleansing it, purifying it, empowering it.  
“If that isn’t the greatest skincare routine,” I giggled, but my voice was cut. As I the dust was making me more and more powerful, more and more spiritual, and more and more magical, I saw a shadow in the shore. The shadow was firmly staring at me, immobile. Then, I heard an echo.  
“You think you know, what you are, what’s to come? You haven’t even begun,” She said in a soft voice.  
The First Slayer. I recognized her.  
“What do you m---?” And then it happened. An explosion the size of a supernova occurred and I felt all the atoms of my body clash, the pressure so immense I felt I was going to implode.  
Something was slithering its way in my skin, it was going so deep, reaching my DNA and merging with it. Suddenly, all of my senses were sharpened, my sight got so clear, I could see the beauty, and I could see the true magic all around me. The world was gently orbiting and my throat was light and breezy. I felt powerful. I felt good again and I felt hopeful again.  
It was time to save Willow.

***

Darkness fell once more upon my shoulders as I flew down the Sunnydale graveyard where the night was still young. It was barely dawn, I could sense it. The forest sang to me and welcomed me in a draught of fresh air that lifted my hair. All the peaceful hearts around me were almost at hand-reach, they were beating quietly, unbothered. But I could also hear the broken hearts. One in particular was throbbing, and it guided me to this graveyard to save it. I landed on my feet and examined the territory. Something was coming this way, it was hiding in the bush.  
“Anya,” I thought. “Keep reciting the spell with Giles and keep Andrew and Jonathan as safe as possible in Spike’s lair. I’m going to create a dome that will protect you from spells temporarily, I have a hunch the anti-spell you’ve translated is wearing off.”  
“Wow, Buffy, cute tricks, you’ve turned witchy,” The drowsy and laughing voice of Willow suddenly emerged and echoed through the forest.  
“I thought you’d hear me,” I said out loud, smiling and shutting off my thoughts at once, fearing she would hear more than she needed. “Willow, show yourself. I’m here to help you heal.”  
“THEN DIE!”  
And a flash of fire erupted from a nearby tree, pelting at me like a canon. I wheeled around and slapped it back with my hand. It crashed on a tree and burned it. Willow was standing a few feet away, her face bloody and her teeth clenched. I had never seen her so mad. Her eyes were blacker than the color itself, so black they almost collapsed under the pigmentation, almost boiled down.  
“You thought you could cure me with an anti-spell, Buffy? I AM A KILLER! I WILL NEVER BE CURED! The only way for this to stop is to end it once and for all.”  
“Yes, you can, WILLOW!” I shouted.  
“Stupid fool,” She mumbled. “Do you know what you’ve done to yourself? You have mutilated your body.”  
“It doesn’t matter, Willow,” I edged closer to her and she ejaculated a massive red light beam from her hand, which clashed with my white beam and both of their ends collided halfway, vigorously trying to eat one another spitting and releasing huge shock-waves that could have melted any normal human’s ear.  
“You think I won’t kill you, you stupid bitch?” She said, panting, her flames overwhelmed by my white light.  
“NO matter what you’ll do Willow, I will always love you.”  
“Not only her, but me!” Xander’s voice leapt from the woods, then Dawn, then Anya, Giles, Jonathan and finally Andrew. They all closed in behind me, all of them wearing a range of sad to desperate expressions. They just couldn’t stand to see someone once so pure, into this botched, grotesque, phony, angry devil.  
Willow looked disgusted.  
“Worms and bugs!” She spat. “All around me. Make it stop.”  
She jabbed her hands in the air. Both of our spells were carried away and skyrocketed, once again, exploding like fireworks in a huge boom.  
“You will never touch me with that filth,” She panted, her knees buckling, her breath short, her eyes wide open with terror, as though she was finally being framed for the crimes she had committed, as though she had no escape anymore but to face us.  
“I will always love you, Willow. WE WILL always love you.”  
I advanced carefully in her direction and she cast another spell, failing to reach me for the third time as I deflected it and it hit a tree, setting it ablaze. We were now surrounded by a ring of fire, licking and eating the grass.  
“I want you to tap in your heart,” I told her. “To see that your soul is not evil, to see what we have accomplished in the last six years.”  
I raised my hands in the air and shouted “Return!” as her silhouette had become fainter for a short moment and her aura almost teleporting. She came back into concrete focus, throwing another fire ball at me, once more unsuccessful to hit me, ricocheting all over the woods and breaking a grave when it had finally lost its orbit. Her Magic was disturbed, fluctuated by mine.  
“And more,” Xander said, moving to my direction.  
Before it broke the grave, the fire ball swept by the fire ring and when both merged, a splash of water came in a wave and swallowed the fire all at once. We were now all paddling our way into the swamp.  
“Remember in kindergarten when you broke the teacher’s yellow crayon? You were inconsolable! You had the most admirable moral grounding ever since your childhood,” He said to her, his eyes so naïve, his look so full of hope. “You’re my best friend, you’re---“He broke off, tears welling down his cheeks, not daring to say more.  
“And last year, you saved me from Glory,” Dawn joined me by the right side. “And you wanted me to see mum again so you pulled that resurrection book. You just couldn’t bear it, you wanted me to be happy again. I know what it is’ like to lose someone, Willow. Someone dear,” In her turn, she broke off in a stuttering sob. “Please.”  
“That’s right,” I said. “She was my mother and I lost her too. I lost everything. I lost the love of my life, I lost my happiness, and I even lost Spike, a soulless monster, for God’s sake. Why do I have to lose my best friend, too?”  
“Out of my way,” She growled through clenched teeth. “I want it to stop.”  
“Can’t you see, Willow?” I insisted. “You are overwhelmed by love. You are overwhelmed by compassion. How could you turn your back from us? You promised there would be blood on my hands, and there has been, tons of buckets of it. And now, it’s my turn to hold my promise, and I gave you my word that I would die with you, and without you killing anyone else. You are Willow and I am Buffy.”  
I was literally inches from her. I could see her body shivering, quaking, her hands shaking and her face twitching.  
“Willow,” I smiled at her. “You fell, a terrible tragedy has happened. But we’re all in this together. We’re all going to stand here with you and hold your hand, even if that means the world is about to end.”  
Very slowly, I reached for her hand. She jerked it away and slapped me.  
“Shut the hell up,” She whispered, her voice breaking up.  
But I didn’t back down an inch.  
“Willow, the hardest thing in this world is to live in it, but the hardest thing in your world is to die in it. Let me help you live, or let’s all die together.”  
“Make it stop, make it stop,” Her voice was almost inaudible. “I want it to stop! I want it to stop!”  
Her body was now uncontrollable. She was shaking so violently she was at risk of collapsing from a seizure. She couldn’t speak anymore, her eyes swelled with heavy tears and her mouth looked like it was instants from being ripped apart. I very gently wrapped my arms around her and whispered to her shaking ear. “I love you, Willow. I’m so sorry for Tara.”  
A tear appeared in my own eye, delicately falling and resting on Willow’s shoulder. The inevitable collapse arrived, and we bot fell on the floor, splashing mud and water. She cried and screamed with all of her might, to the point where I could feel her throat being lacerated by her shrieking lament, but I didn’t release her. I squeezed her tight and cried with her, repeating endlessly. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”  
She cried and cried until my own shirt was soaked with her tears. From above us, Xander bent over and embraced us, sobbing saccadic cries, whispering. “I love you, my best friend.” Then came Dawn, falling to my side and wrapping her arms around all of us, followed by Anya, who was moved and weary, and finally Giles, who, with the size of his body, was able to control all of our shivers and slowly, our bodies were all subdued. All that could be heard in the forest was Willow’s wailing, and me, repeating to her, “I love you.”

***

Black and white orbs wormed their way out of Willow and my body, floating in the air. We all raised our head to see them orbiting around each other, dancing, merging, and finally annihilating each other. They imploded with a big muffled boom and another sound-wave was released, rippling across the forest and making all the birds in the trees fly away, all the animals gathering speed and running as far as possible. To an outside viewer, we looked like a big heap of clothes piled upon each other, for our heads were all so squeezed into each other’s shoulders that they were no longer visible. Finally, I allowed myself to release my grip and look at Willow; her hair was no longer black, it had turned back to ginger, the veins in her face disappeared and her eyes glowed green, clouded by puddles of tears. I grabbed her back, for she didn’t have the strength to straighten up, and this time I never let her go again…Until something strange happened.  
A shiver started shaking us, but I could tell it didn’t come from Willow, It came from me. I frowned as I didn’t understand what was happening. I mean, I wasn’t cold, I wasn’t scared. I had just saved my best friend and Jonathan and Andrew were still alive, withdrawn and cowering in a corner of a tree, terrified. So what was causing this shiver?  
Giles abruptly stood up and stripped Dawn, Xander and Anya away like he was pulling out Band-Aids.  
“Giles?” I asked apprehensively. “What’s happening?”  
“EVERYBODY, GET AWAY AND GET DOWN!”  
Next thing I knew, I was grabbed and pulled in the air by some invisible, magnetic force, and I was being choked, something was trying to claw its way out of my body. I gagged and gasped, but no sound came out. I was paralyzed in the air, anesthetized. My tears were frozen in my face, and I could feel my body sending off colossal shock-waves, disturbing the forest, breaking tombs in the graveyard.  
I tried to think out loud for someone to hear me, but no thought came to my mind. It was all hollow, until that very last moment where I slowly, but not painlessly, closed my eyes and fainted away, one last shock-wave destroying everything in its wake. Far away in the horizon, the sun was rising.

***

I could faintly hear birds twittering and branches rattling on the window. Something comfy and warm was covering me. My eyes slowly opened to a dark room, which I registered as mine after a long moment of reflection. I didn’t know whether I was disoriented or amnesic. Either way, I thought something was wrong. I felt…I don’t know, different. You can’t have a word for everything but I just knew something was not in its place…And why was it dark? Why wasn’t it daylight? What had happened during my sleep? What made me sleep in the first place?  
With a searing pain, everything came back to me, rushing, screaming and screeching. I jerked the cover out of me and sat bolt upright.  
“Willow,” I whispered, groping my way in the darkness until I found a light source and lit the hallway.  
“Willow?” I called, slamming her bedroom door open, finding nothing but clothes and an empty, unused bed.  
“Dawn? Xander?” I yelled in the stairs. When I was finally down, Giles was standing up, waiting for me.  
He smiled, a warm smile, and I couldn’t wait to return it to him.  
“Hello, Buffy,” He said.  
I dropped my shoulders and rushed to embrace him, letting all of my worries and anguish boil away for just a second.  
“I know you have some questions, that’s why I made you cookies.”  
“Made?” I asked. “Since when do you bake?”  
“Well,” He said, cleaning his glasses. “I’ve spent time on my own, I had to learn to be independent. How about you?”  
“I learnt how to braid my hair,” I smiled. Weirdly, I was comfortable being a child around Giles.  
He looked at me, not really knowing what to say.  
“You don’t have to follow this conversation,” I said and he wallowed on the sofa.  
“What a relief.”  
I sat beside him.  
“Where’s Willow?”  
“In my house,” he quickly said. “You needn’t worry. She’s been asleep for as long as you. I have Xander and Dawn standing by her. Anya is making some arrangements for me. I’ve decided to take her with me to England for a while. She needs to stay away from the hell-mouth.”  
I sighed, “Tell me about it. Jonathan and Andrew?”  
“They seem to have taken advantage of the situation to escape. I doubt they will be a threat to anyone, though. The shock-wave you have released acted as black-magic detergent to all nearby living thing,” He smiled, proudly.  
“Nice,” I chuckled.  
I grabbed a cookie and nibbled it.  
“What?” Giles asked reproachfully. “Afraid it’ll taste bad?”  
“No, no, I’m just…I’m just not very hungry right now. And God, how long was I asleep? I remember…I remember sunrise, when….when it happened.”  
Giles stiffened up. “When what happened, Buffy?”  
“I don’t really know,” I whispered, standing up, for I needed to stretch. “I guess the magic did what it had to do, canceled Willow’s power then left my body. But it just was so…painful. I mean, the kind of pain you feel when you have…I don’t know…a miscarriage…or a limb being removed of your body. I felt like a part of me was taken away.” I stopped in my pacing, narrowing my eyes towards a focused Giles. “But of course, it’s all normal, right?”  
He seemed to hesitate a moment, then said. “I’m curious. How did you do to strip Willow from her powers so easily?”  
“Oh, it wasn’t that easy,” I smiled. “But I was able to improvise a few tricks to make it more effective. Remember when I sent you telepathy signals?”  
He nodded.  
“Well, I was able to affect her by only thinking about the anti-spell Anya prepared that same night, earlier. So I hoped she would catch my signal, given she had hijacked the network, and the moment she did, I worked some magic on her the same way.”  
Raising his eyebrows, Giles took a bite of his cookies.  
“And that’s not just that,” I continued enthusiastically, as though I was proudly narrating my A+ homework. “Remember when she slapped me?”  
“As a matter of fact, I wish I hadn’t,” He groaned, bits of cookies in his mouth.  
“Hit her back the moment she touched me, it made it all gradually easier to get to her, until I hugged her. I just knew that by being around her, she would give up…somehow, I could also relate to her, magic does get to your head. I mean why would I have felt that pain at the end, otherwise?”  
Giles gagged again, and this time I didn’t miss the hint.  
“Giles, what are you not telling me?” I asked with a tone of suspicion.  
“I just think it was brilliant of you, I couldn’t be prouder” He smiled, dabbing his mouth with a tissue to clean it. “You’ve saved us all, and you still managed to do it without taking a single human life, not even one who was corrupted by evil and black magic.”  
I smiled, but it was an artificial, unconvinced smile. “I don’t really know about that.”  
Then we both fell silent, looking at our shoes. Well, he was looking at his shoes, I was looking at my feet.  
“Will,” I started but broke off, not daring to look at him.  
Giles waited.  
“Will you still be proud of me if I tell you Dawn’s been acting like a total kleptomaniac?”  
He frowned, obviously not understanding how I was relating Dawn’s mischiefs to my failure as a sister and a guardian.  
“Buffy, Dawn’s a teenager,” He tried to rationalize but I bolted out of my position, angry and feeling dirty again.  
“You don’t understand,” I said. “I’ve failed in almost every aspect of my life. I’ve barely been able to make ends meet with my thankless job at the DMP, I’ve been so self-centered, caring about myself and neglecting to see the pain in my friends…And I’ve been sleeping with Spike.”  
Somehow, complaining to him comforted me.  
He just looked at me for a moment and giggled. “Well, you’ve definitely surpassed my cookie-skills.” And we burst out laughing. A nervous laughter but it still took the edge off.  
“Spike, though?” He asked, looking revolted, but it really was the subject I had been trying to avoid. I thought, maybe I could slip it in between other damages unheard.  
“Yeah,” I sighed. “Spike.”  
“You couldn’t just beep Ang—oh, Sorry,” He said, rearranging himself. “Forgot the curse.”  
“Spike’s got a chip, much better,” I smiled, sarcastically.  
“Out of all the people, why him, though?”  
I didn’t respond, my eyes lost focus on the cookies displayed on the table.  
“I guess…feeling pain is better than feeling nothing at all.”  
“What do you mean?”  
I could feel the tears trickling down my eyes and I vehemently repressed them.  
“I know someday, there will be an expiration date on this excuse, but coming back from heaven,” I looked at him, hoping he would understand without torturing my brain to recess all I’ve been through. “It broke me. It damaged me. All I had left was my mission to save the world. All I had left was that, and I couldn’t even do it right…” I couldn’t continue. My headache skyrocketing again, I plunged my head in my hands.  
Giles didn’t move. For a long moment, he kept opening his mouth and closing it again.  
Finally, not being able to hold my tears, I let them flow down.  
“Can you forgive me, Buffy?” He whispered.  
This was the last thing I had expected from him to say.  
“What?” I grimaced, crooking my head to glare at him.  
This time, it was he who stood up. He paced back and forth in the living room, the rising sun reflected on his glasses.  
“I never should have left.”  
“No, Giles,” I shook my head. “You’re not going to take the blame on this one. You had every right to leave, and you did what you had to do. I’m a big girl, I’m supposed to take care of myself and my family.”  
“You’re my family, Buffy,” He said, stiffening up again.  
“I---I didn’t mean it like that,” I lowered my head, shamefully.  
“Oh, but I’m not sure you’ll forgive me,” He mumbled, almost inaudibly, and I wasn’t sure whether I was supposed to respond to that. It seemed like one of those moments where he was thinking out loud.  
He massaged his temples and sat on a nearby chair.  
“You have faced a severe case of depression. Your happiness was stripped away from you,” He said. “I should have been here to support you. I shouldn’t have made the choice for you. It was selfish, It was so selfish…My god what did I do?”  
“Giles?” I looked at him, fearfully. “What are you talking about?”  
“Buffy,” He cried and came to his knees next to me. “Can you please forgive me?”  
“Forgive you what?” I asked, sheepishly. “I told you, I don’t hold you accountable for all that’s happened!” I tried to cheer him on. He didn’t look convinced but the look of misery seemed to wear off a little. “Giles, I’m screwed up, that’s just it,” I grinned. “One way or another, I’m going to have to get used to it. I’m probably going to hell anyway, this time around.”  
“That’s not true,” He said, adamantly.  
I shrugged. “It’s obvious you weren’t around these last months. I’m just going to have to get used to it. Like I told you, feeling pain is better than feeling nothing.”  
“Buffy,” Giles sat up, and he seemed to pop some colors in his face again. “Life is not defined by who will go to heaven or who will go to hell. It is defined by what we learn and what we teach.”  
“Wow,” I said. “Where did you learn that one from?”  
“The guardian.”  
“Oh yeah,” I said. “I have got to get an appointment with her. She gives the best exfoliating products. Bear in mind Willow has sent me a horde of zombies that went all viral on me…but let’s forget about that,” I said when I saw the misery dawning on him again at the same time as sunrise. Remembering the zombie raid was not the best anecdote, right now.  
“So, everything is fine, I guess,” I smiled. “Willow’s okay, magic is at its rightful place, and I’m the Slayer. I’ll try to do my best to live up to the Slayer’s expectations.”  
Giles looked at me, it seemed as though he was having a hard time expressing himself.  
“Yes,” He smiled after a long moment. “Everything is well.”  
For a brief moment, I thought I had seen a silver object float around my garden, but then shrugged it off.  
“Why are you here, by the way? I keep having this feeling that you want to tell me something.”  
“No,” He said, standing up. “I just came to check up on you, and bring you cookies. Like I told you, I knew you had questions.”  
I chuckled at the cookie reference.  
“Thank you, but not really, no. About the questions, I mean,” I quickly added, when he pretended to be offended at his cookies being rejected. “Apart from me feeling weird after the magic lost its effect, and don’t even get me started on how filthy I felt when I smashed the undead…I had never felt so unhuman. Just…you know, casually ripping intestines apart.”  
“I guess it’s different when they leave a trace after they’re dead.”  
“Especially when you’re used to a clean pile of dust when you finish your homework,” I added.  
And he was striding to the kitchen until I interrupted him.  
“So,” I called and he stopped. “That pain I felt when I had the magic stripped out. It’s not a side effect or something, right? I’m still me? I woke up with this feeling…that something in me was missing. I can’t really explain it, but I feel weary.”  
“You’re just tired,” He said reassuringly. “You’ve been fighting all night, and you’ve catapulted a great energy from your body. It’ll wear off with the time. In the meantime, I’ll be here for you. I’m staying.”  
“I…I thought you were going back to England to help Willow?” I frowned at him, and it was as though he had just remembered what he had said.  
“What? Yes,” He corrected himself, nervously cleaning his glasses. “I’m staying before I take back Willow, of course.”  
“Giles, I can’t help this feeling that tells me you’re not just here to bring me cookies and check my temperature,” I told him, now lucid enough to have a colder edge on my voice. “I…You know earlier, Willow said something about me mutilating my body…any idea what she meant?” I asked after a moment of nervous hesitation.  
“So, you’re asking me to delve into the imagination of an evil being?” he smiled at me. “Don’t go too far in your interpretations.”  
“You’re right,” I quickly said, shrugging. “I’m probably reading into much into. I should be Buffy the paranoia Slayer.”  
He nodded at me one last time before he swept past me and vanished up the stairs.  
“I thought you were going to the kitchen,” I mumbled, unheard by him, climbing the stairs by pairs of four, his eyes blinking frantically, his sweat pearly and shimmering on the sun, rising and shining on Sunnydale once more.

TO BE CONTINUED.


End file.
